Managing retirement plans isn't getting any easier. But – you have the option to delegate many investment responsibilities to a trusted provider. Learn more through the free case studies, whitepapers, and RFP builder in our OCIO resource centers.

Behavioral Finance: How Participants Make Decisions"The simplest choice is to simply not have to opt out of the program. A fund menu may have 15 or 20 investment choices. But the idea of the QDIA managed account solution is that the answer has been determined and the only choice the participant has to make is to not opt out of the program."
Fi360

A Blueprint for Reuniting Orphaned 401(k) Accounts with Their Owners"[A]fter auto-portability was launched earlier this year for [one] large plan sponsor ... more than 15% of 'orphaned' participant accounts who were 'reunited' with their current-employer plan responded to a notice offering to help them complete a roll-in.... [Of] the participants who responded, 91% of them gave their consent to the roll-in and directed that the consolidation of their multiple accounts into their current-employer plan move forward, paying a small fee to do so. Of those who rolled accounts forward, 55% had balances that were less than $1,000."
Retirement Clearinghouse, via Employee Benefit News

This resource applies the trusted "Tools & Techniques" approach to this complex area, making it simple for you to confidently guide your clients through even the most complex employee benefit and retirement planning processes. 10% discount code: BENLINK.

Adding Religiously Compliant Funds to a Retirement Plan"[To] include a fund in a plan requires a fiduciary due diligence process -- a review of quantitative and qualitative characteristics. Some funds, while religiously compliant, might not pass the criteria used to judge other funds in the plan.... Participant education would be key for any company deciding to add religiously compliant funds."
PLANSPONSOR

FINRA Shares Examination Findings"FINRA [recently] released a report on its findings from recent examinations ... It contains selected observations for the purpose of highlighting issues that frequently occur or due to their broad impact on investors and markets.... The Report highlights a total of 11 topics [which include] ... Cybersecurity ... Product Suitability ... Best Execution ... Alternative Investments Held in IRAs."
The Wagner Law Group

Life Insurance: The Versatile Tool for Retirement Protection (PDF)10 pages. "Just as human capital faces risk -- mainly premature death and disability -- during a couple's working years, retirees face a number of risks that may negatively impact their financial capital and the resulting income it is expected to produce. These risks include the risk of outliving financial capital, investment risk, healthcare costs, and taxes.... [P]ermanent life insurance can be used to help replace financial capital that is diminished due to the occurrence of each of these risk events during retirement."
Prudential

PBGC Fees Rise for Underfunded Pensions"GE's fees surged more than sixfold, to about $238 million, in 2017 from 2012, according to the PBGC data ... Boeing's bill was $151.7 million, about four times what it paid in 2014.... GE, whose pension fund is short by about $31 billion, said in November it would borrow $6 billion to fund its plan. After Boeing's fund fell short by about $20 billion at the end of 2016, the company said in July that it would add $3.5 billion of its shares to a scheduled $500 million pension contribution."
Bloomberg

Benefits in General

Text of IRS Notice 2018-03: 2018 Standard Mileage Rates (PDF)"The standard mileage rate for transportation or travel expenses is 54.5 cents per mile for all miles of business use (business standard mileage rate).... The standard mileage rate is 14 cents per mile for use of an automobile in rendering gratuitous services to a charitable organization under Section 170."
Internal Revenue Service [IRS]

Executive Compensationand Nonqualified Plans

Accelerating Deductions for Annual Bonuses and Stock Units Paid in 2018"Companies whose 2018 bonus payments may not be accruable in 2017 because of [various] contingencies might still amend their bonus plans before the end of their 2017 fiscal year in order to accrue the liability and support a deduction in 2017.... [C]onsider the following steps: [1] establish a 'fixed minimum bonus payment,' and/or a 'fixed minimum RSU (restricted stock units)/PSU (performance stock units) payment' for the entire group of employees in the company's bonus and equity plans ... [2] communicate that 'minimum promise' to the affected employees; and [3] clarify or amend existing plans, to ensure that this minimum promised amount cannot be reduced after year-end."
Morgan Lewis

Parsonage Allowance Can Be Included as Comp under Contribution Formula?Client is a private high school with religious affiliation. They want to include the Rabbi/Head of School's parsonage allowance in the determination of the company contribution (5% of pay). For common law employee that's not taxable income, so I see no authority to include this in wages. Agree?
BenefitsLink Message Boards

Help for Participant Whose Ex-Spouse 'Forgot' to Mention a Retirement PlanI've been talking to an individual whose ex-spouse "forgot" to mention one or more retirement plans as assets in a divorce settlement. The ex is a physician who is the plan sponsor. She's talked with ERISA attorneys. Apparently there was a money purchase plan that terminated in 2010 and its assets were merged into a profit sharing plan that was in existence (we think) at the time of the divorce. ERISA attorneys suggest that she involve the IRS or DOL. I'm aware of EBSA's call centers that assist plan participants, though I don't know of anything similar on the IRS side. I'm at a loss to understand what either agency can do about the fact that the assets of the plan were not disclosed in a divorce settlement.
BenefitsLink Message Boards

Nonqualified Deferred Comp Plan: Sponsor Can Make Vesting Elections on Behalf of Participants?The plan offers two vesting elections that comply with the 409A fixed payment and timing requirement. So there is not a 409A compliance problem. But the company sometimes makes the election on a participant's behalf. Rather than giving two options, the company just goes with one. Is this allowed or must it be corrected? Should there be a retroactive amendment?
BenefitsLink Message Boards

Follow ALL New Discussions:
► Subscribe (free) to the new, daily BenefitsLink Message Boards Digest (which contains ALL new discussions, not just the selected discussions shown above).
► See a sample issue.

BenefitsLink Retirement Plans Newsletter, ISSN no. 1536-9587. Copyright 2017 BenefitsLink.com, Inc. All materials contained in this newsletter are protected by United States copyright law and may not be reproduced, distributed, transmitted, displayed, published or broadcast without the prior written permission of BenefitsLink.com, Inc., or in the case of third party materials, the owner of those materials. You may not alter or remove any trademark, copyright or other notices from copies of the content.

Links to web sites other than BenefitsLink.com and EmployeeBenefitsJobs.com are offered as a service to our readers; we were not involved in their production and are not responsible for their content.